SOLD: Jagged Souls MC

by Naomi West

  I nodded. “You might be right.” We drank in silence again for a long time. But before I could think of something else to say, some kind of reassurance that I was going to think it all the way through before making a decision, Bax stood up from his seat and walked away. I didn’t watch him leave; I didn’t have to. I knew his shoulders would have been slightly slumped in defeat.

  No matter what we did next, we would lose.

  I swallowed down the beer, though it was suddenly deeply bitter in my mouth. Without Bax to keep the memories at bay, I found myself drowning in them.

  # # #

  “I need to do what’s best for my son,” my father said, holding out his hands imploring. “And the Edge isn’t a safe place for him.”

  Kelly frowned, looking like he was ready to bite a piece off of my father. “Finding out you have a child has made you soft, Charles.”

  I know my father asked me to leave the Edge, to walk away from the possible violence and get to the bus stop. I was ordered to leave without him if Kelly refused to release him. But I knew where my loyalties were. I belonged at the Edge, just like my father belonged at the Edge.

  I watched him impassively as he begged for my release from a life I’d never been intended for. My father looked small and weak in my young eyes. But he continued to beg for me. Not himself, just me. He wanted my freedom and must have known he was putting himself at risk for it. But none of that crossed my mind at the time. I just remember thinking about how old and tired and weak he looked.

  “So you would go against the Devil’s Edge and me just to save your precious son from what? A future he wants?”

  My father swallowed hard and looked down at the ground. “A future he thinks he wants.”

  “Is it really so bad here, Charles?”

  There wasn’t a safe reply to that, so my father kept his mouth shut. He’d made his case. I stood behind the stairs, my eyes watching to see what Kelly would do. I’d worked hard to land my position in the Edge; I was furious to think that my dad was going to throw away all of it.

  To my surprise, Kelly didn’t yell or scream. He very calmly went over to the wall, grabbed something off one of the shelves. His whole body was relaxed as he turned, swinging the golf club with an efficiency and emotionlessness that only came from true psychotic tendencies. When the club connected with my father’s skull, I gasped, but the sound wasn’t loud enough to cover the wet crunching noise as my father’s skull crumpled under Kelly’s swing.

  Kelly stood over my father, lying on the ground. He was bloody, broken, his breath wheezing between broken teeth out of a punctured lung. Blood spilled from his mouth, his ears, his nose. The slowly growing puddle of red was too big. There would be no coming back from it. I watched with wide eyes. I was barely tall enough to see over the half-wall of the stairs from where I watched.

  My father wheezed again, his face so swollen I couldn’t recognize him. He tried to speak, but instead of words, blood spilled out.

  “There now, Charlie. Still want to leave the Devil’s Edge, you lying sack of shit?” Kelly asked, pulling my father’s head back by his bloodied blonde hair. “I didn’t think so.” With a sickening, wet crunch of bones shattering, Kelly slammed my father’s face against the pavement one final time.

  At the time, I was shaken, but I knew that my father had gotten the punishment he deserved. By as I’d grown older, I knew that to be wrong. Kelly had sucker punched my father; it was the only way he could have won against my dad in a physical fight. I knew now what Kelly was; I wish I could have seen it when I was still young enough to flee. Before Josh was born, before I became so tangled up in the whole life.

  Kelly was a psycho and a coward. If I did end up going to Carlos, it would be only what he deserved. Sighing, I glanced around the broken building slowly being put back together. But in my mind’s eye, the whole place was filled with already dead bodies, Christine and Carlos standing over our dead bodies, getting ready to battle one another.

  And the Devil’s Edge was turned to dust.

  Chapter Thirty-One

  Ivy

  I think Creed making me part of the Edge has only made things worse. I glanced around the building. Instead of being ignored or tolerated, I was watched much more closely by the men and women of the Edge. Their attention was from a distance, however. Not a single one spoke or looked at me once I got too close. It was like I was diseased or unlucky.

  Feeling a little like a pariah, I sought out Pearl. Perhaps she would be able to tell me what I could do.

  Thrills trickled over every inch of my body when I thought about how I had been claimed as Creed’s woman, but the feeling of being a part of the Edge still eluded me. I wished Creed hadn’t run off so quickly; I just wanted his to explain my place. As amazing as the sex was and forgetting the feelings I had for Creed, I didn’t belong here.

  And Creed is furious. Now he has two people to be used against him instead of just one. I knew how much of a burden I’d become, but I couldn’t see how to fix it.

  Wandering around the Edge, I watched as a few of the members worked to put bikes, walls, and rooms back together, cleaning up broken pieces and salvaging all of the pieces that were worth reusing or fixing. I wanted to help, but I knew I would be next to useless. I’d never been good with my hands.

  After about ten minutes of wandering aimlessly, I found Pearl. She was standing beside Patrick, slightly favoring her injured leg. They stood side-by-side, their backs straight and their hands busy. Patrick was putting a workbench of some kind back together, and Pearl was holding a slat up for her other half.

  Envious, I watched the two of them. They worked together like two hands attached to the same brain. It always seemed like the other knew exactly what the other needed without asking. It was so different from the stumbling, floundering feeling I got when I was Creed, I felt the air leave my lungs in a rush and refuse to return for a long moment. Knowing I could never be that to Creed, never be the cog that helped the wheel of the Edge turn, left me feeling breathless and hollow.

  So I have to change it.

  Determined, I pushed my shoulders back and walked over to them.

  “How can I help?” I asked, my voice more of a whisper than the firm, loud, confident voice I’d wanted.

  Neither of them turned to look at me for even a second. Pearl’s mouth turned down in a frown, but that was the only indication I got from either of them.

  After a long second of silence, Pearl spoke. “Creed’s woman, huh? How do you expect to help with those injured hands, exactly?” She was dressed as usual, in bright, gypsy clothing, but there was something darker about her today. Pearl’s eyes had dark circles wrapped around them, making her skin look pale and thin. Her hands shook like she’d lost all of her steadiness. I was in awe at her ability to stand with her injury; Pearl was so much stronger than I was. I couldn't even be useful with some scratches and cuts on my fingers.

  I glanced down at the white wrappings around my wrists and my fingers. I’d wrapped them myself, awkwardly, but the bandages held. They seemed to do the job. “I don’t know. Measuring, cooking, cleaning? Hell, I’d even walk down 5th naked if it would somehow help.”

  Pearl finally looked at me, her eyes as hard as glass. “Well, Creed’s woman, I don’t think any of that will help. Perhaps you should take up some embroidery or something.” She stared at my eye for a moment, unblinking. “Elsewhere.”

  The cruelty in her voice shocked me; I just gaped at her, unsure of how to respond. What had changed that made Pearl so against me? “I--”

  Pearl held up a hand. “Don’t bother. If you want to be useful to Creed and the Edge, I figure you should find something useful to be.”

  “To be?”

  Wiping her forehead with the back of her hand, Pearl grimaced. “As you are now, you’re awfully useless.” She straightened out her back and Patrick paused in their work, his eyes locked on my face. “Without some spine or something useful to contribute, neither Creed nor Kelly w
ill let you stick around long. You aren’t good for Creed as you are now, so you would be better off disappearing. Like you should have done in first place.” Pearl’s voice was lined with shattered glass and cut deeply into my body and soul. Her voice was so cold that it stung.

  But she was right, of course. But what could be done? How could I prove to her or prove to Creed that I was worth saving? To truly be part of the Edge, I would need to be stronger, louder, and riskier. I would need to go hunting and bring home dinner for the pack.

  I met Pearl’s eyes, feeling my own features harden into stone. “You’re right,” I said, balling my hands into fists. “You are absolutely right.”

  And that’s when both Pearl and Patrick smiled, lights warming the ice that had formed in their eyes. They nodded in tandem before returning to their work. I felt a little better, but also a little worse. Glad that Pearl was just trying to teach me a lesson the hard way and that I hadn’t lost her friendship, my heart lightened a little. But at the same time, I felt the weight of her words on my shoulders. What can I do to make myself look strong and useful to Creed?

  I had no ideas, and nowhere to start.

  Wandering around the Edge, I pondered my past, my future, and all of the possible ways I could impress these people. I started forming a plan in my head; I didn’t know if it was a good plan, but it was more than just doing nothing.

  Josh found me after a while. “I’m glad you’re okay,” he said, bouncing on his feet. His sneakers looked a little worse for wear, and he had a few bruises on his face and arms, but he seemed unfazed by his kidnapping.

  “You’re so much braver than I could ever be,” I told him. “I’m glad you’re okay, too.”

  He smiled, kicking debris everywhere with his feet. There was a little bit of a shadow over his eyes, but Josh seemed to be in good spirits. “I wasn’t sure my dad would go back to get you, but he did. I-- I’m glad.”

  Smiling, I brushed my hand over his cheek. “I didn’t want to be left behind, so I was pretty happy, too.”

  “So you are part of the Devil’s Edge now.”

  I nodded. “I guess so. Your dad hasn’t explained all the rules to me yet.”

  “We should help out then, I guess. Shouldn’t we?” Josh sounded so uncertain, but he still looked around the Edge, looking for things for us to do. “Let’s go see what Sam is up to. He’ll let me help.”

  So we wandered over to Sam together. Sam was one of the older members, and he was in the middle of holing up one of the back entrances. “What are you doing, Sam?”

  The older man looked up at Josh, then at me, his face creased with a frown. He was grizzled and bearded, his skin like leather. But he was shirtless, and his body hadn’t lost any definition in its age. He looked as tough as nails, and I had to swallow hard to hide my fear down where it belonged. “I’m closing up half of the entrances to make this place more defensible. You, hand me that hammer.”

  Josh picked up the hammer and handed it over. “Here you go!”

  “Good, now hold this. You, girl!” he called to me unexpectedly. But I ran forward to help anyway. “Hold up the other end of this 2x4. It needs to be level.”

  Without even a glance down at my injured hands, I did as I was asked, holding the bar up so he could nail it to the wall. “That should hold. Come on, you two. Let’s start the next one.”

  And I did. There wasn’t much I could do, but I worked as hard as I could. I helped hold, nail, and glue. I mixed cement and stews, swept up shrapnel, and worked until my hands bled through the bandages. I even served the communal meal all of the workers shared. It may have been my imagination, but a few of the faces looked a little softer towards me than they had in the past.

  Or it’s all in my head. But when I glanced at Pearl, she was smiling. She nodded at me. Although she still looked tired and grim, there was a little bit of a lightness to her limp as she came for her share of the soup.

  “You ain’t too bad at this, girly,” Bax winked at me as he shuffled through the line. “Best be careful; if you cook too well, they’ll end up recruiting you for it later.”

  I smiled, handing the ladle over to one of the other women so I could tighten my bandages. “I’ll be careful.”

  “Oh, those look bad. Once you’re done, come see me, and I’ll put them on proper. I have a first aid kit over by my bike.”

  I nodded, thankful for some friendly conversation and a smile. “Thank you, Bax. I am awkward tying with my left hand, so I could use the help.”

  I finished up my duties as quickly as I could, Josh still glued to my side, as the hour chimed nearly 11PM. I was dragging, my feet heavy on the concrete floors. But I kept my head up; it wouldn’t do to show any weakness at all. They already had a low opinion of me. It would be best not to make it worse.

  As I made my way over to Bax, the giant, muscle-bound man pulled out a first aid kit, as promised. I could feel a lot of eyes on us as if they wondered if I was being too friendly with Bax. Sighing, I tried to turn my attention away from them, to keep my eyes on what was important, but it felt like I could feel their eyes on my skin.

  “Don’t worry about them, Ivy,” Bax said. His huge hands were surprisingly gentle as he cleaned my cuts with something that stung my fingers and my eyes. It smelled so strong that I was pretty sure there wasn’t a germ in the world that wanted any part of it. As soon as the sting started to fade a little, however, my cuts went numb.

  I sighed in relief. “What was that?”

  “It’s like homemade Neosporin. Pearl makes it. Smells like the ass end of something, doesn’t it?” Bax chuckled. “But damned if it doesn’t work.”

  I flexed my fingers, unable to keep the relief from my voice and my face. “Thanks, Bax.” I’d put up with the pain all day and still managed to work with everyone else, but that didn’t mean finally getting some relief from it all didn’t make me feel a million times better. Josh sat down next to me, and the three of us chatted about zombie movies and inane subjects. The less we talked about the Edge, Creed, or anything else about this place, the brighter Josh’s face became.

  But then Christine walked in the front door, wrapped like a serpent around Kelly’s arm, and a shadow passed over all of us. It was hard not to feel a little bit smaller with the two of them in the room. The temperature seemed to drop as I saw the look of rage on Christine’s and the amusement on Kelly’s.

  They glanced around the club, Kelly not even noting all of the hard work his people had put into the clubhouse all damned day. Instead, his eyes searched the crowd for someone to mess with.

  Unfortunately, their eyes landed right on Creed.

  Chapter Thirty-Two

  Creed

  “I see your taste in women hasn’t improved since Josh’s mother,” Kelly said, his face filled with wicked humor. I was too tired to put up with Kelly’s shit today, and he seemed to know it somehow. It was like he could feel everything Creed was feeling. I knew that manic look in his eyes better than anything.

  He was looking for a disobedient underling to punish.

  I refused to be that underling.

  Taking a deep breath, I nodded. “She’s hot, though,” I answered noncommittally. I refused to let him get under my skin.

  “I bet. I wouldn’t mind taking her for a ride. I bet she’s a slut behind closed doors, isn’t she?” Kelly licked his lip exaggeratedly, his eyes locked on the back of Ivy’s neck.

  I raised my eyebrows, a small smile playing across my lips, but I didn’t say anything. Inside I was seething. “Speaking of sluts, where did Christine wander off to?” I asked, my eyes roaming the room. She had entered the Edge on Kelly’s arm like she owned the place; it was odd she hadn’t clung to him like the tumor she was.

  Kelly chuckled darkly, completely ignoring my question. “Does that Ivy let you tie her up? I think she’d look nice doubled over, ropes around her wrists and ankles.”

  “I’m sure she would if I wanted that.” I did my best not to look as disgusted as I felt
; I’d seen some of the victims of Kelly’s little fetish after he was done with them. I would give almost anything to save Ivy from a similar fate. Fucking sadist.

  His eyes gleaming with madness, Kelly grinned at me like an idiot. “I see; you like it when she has her hands free. I bet she knows exactly what to do with those hands.” He turned back again to look at Ivy, his eyes running too freely over her body. “I like sluts that let you choke them. I bet she would look beautiful as I strangled her.”

  I swallowed my gut reaction to his twisted fantasies as he kept spelling them out. I wanted to punch him, to kick in that smirk. It took everything I had just to keep my face neutral. Just as Kelly’s sick, twisted little mind got too much for my control, Christine made an entrance, interrupting his train of thought. I could have kissed her as she walked over toward Kelly, moving his mind from Ivy to cartel business.